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  • Neurodivergent people score 10% higher for tech skills

    Finito World

    Due to the lack of digitally skilled employees, the industry is looking for ways to identify candidates who are likely to be good in the tech field. A new study suggests that people with autism, ADHD, and dyslexia are better suited to tech roles than others.

    The digital skills company With You With Me (WYWM) conducted a study of 12,000 test results to find out what traits make a person best suited to the tech industry. The study found that people with autism, ADHD, and dyslexia scored 10% higher for tech-based skills than the general population.

    WYWM Neurodiversity Lead Jack Desmond explains how this new research could help to solve the digital skills crisis.

    “Our research has shown that autistic, dyslexic or ADHD individuals, as well as those with other cognitive differences, can play a key role in solving the digital skills crisis which engulfs the technology industry,” Desmond says, “Neurodivergent individuals are grossly underrepresented when it comes to employment in the UK, and this research shows they possess the necessary aptitude and skills that employers are looking for.”

    The research shows that 32% of neurodivergent people scored higher in the spatial awareness category, and 10% scored higher in the digital symbol coding category. Both of these skills translate to engineering, IT, and data analysis careers. Desmond is passionate about the subject, and believes that more must be done to recognise the unique skills of neurodivergent people.

    “As an autistic person, I am greatly encouraged to see neurodivergent people recognised for the unique value they bring, but the next step is for widespread training and deployment into key roles within the technology industry where they will make a tangible difference,” Desmond says, “The benefit will be enormous for individuals to be given more opportunities, and for organisations to help solve the digital skills crisis.”

    Credit: WithYouWIthMe

  • IT industry worst affected by pandemic, study finds

    Finito World

     

    We’re more than halfway through 2022, and the pandemic appears to be behind us. Restrictions have been lifted, and many industries are now getting back on their feet. However, it is clear that there are lingering effects of the pandemic in some sectors, so the training hub School of Marketing set out to find which industries are still struggling.

    By analysing ONS data regarding the number of new businesses created and the number of businesses which closed in each sector, both pre and post-pandemic, it is clear that the information and communication industry has taken the biggest hit. Before the pandemic, 92 IT businesses closed for every 100 created. Post-pandemic, 173 IT businesses close for every 100 which open.

    This is most likely due to a combination of factors, including the industry’s reliance on overseas consumption, global supply chain disruption, and shipping and delivery bottlenecks.

    The second most affected industry is finance and insurance, which saw a 50% increase in the number of businesses closing post-pandemic. Pre-pandemic, about 40 businesses closed for every 100 created. Post-pandemic, that number is up to 72.

    CEO of School of Marketing Ritchie Mehta points out that the stagnating number of new businesses makes skilled employees extremely valuable in the post-pandemic market.

    “As entrepreneurs look to protect themselves against a harsher business environment, the value of skilled employees has never been higher,” Mehta says, “This data shows how much more difficult it has become to survive as a business since the pandemic. In the two years before the impact of Covid-19 on average more businesses were created than closed each quarter, but now the numbers of company births and deaths are basically equal.”

    Across the board, businesses are now closing at a slightly higher rate than they are being created – 101.5 for every 100. Before the pandemic, about 87 businesses closed for every 100 created. It is unknown how long these effects will last, but it is clear that it will take time to reach those much sought after ‘normal’ levels once again.

    Source: https://schoolofmarketing.co

  • Lessons from a young entrepreneur: a conversation with Zack Fortag

    Patrick Crowder talks to the 21-year-old entrepreneur on how he got his start and what his future holds

     

    Zack Fortag never connected with the traditional education system. He left school at 16 to find his own way in life through entrepreneurial spirit. Now, at 21, he is both a business and charity owner. I spoke with him to find out how he’s made it happen.

    “I basically grew up in an entrepreneurial type of family and also an education type of family where some were teachers and some were business people. At around 13-14 years old I started to really dislike school,” Fortag says, “I was always very naughty at school, and I never really got on well with traditional education, so I basically decided to start two different businesses at school.”

    One of these businesses was the fairly classic game of selling candy to other students, but the other was much more innovative. The video game FIFA’s online currency, which can be used to buy items in-game, would often fluctuate in price. Fortag saw this opportunity and began selling FIFA coins to other students much in the same way that a stock is traded – buy low, sell high. Fortag says that it wasn’t until he began reading Alan Sugar that he began to branch out into different business ventures which eventually led to the creation of Ahead of Time Academy.

    “I did that until about 15 then started reading Alan Sugar’s book, and it basically told me about wholesale goods. I spent 500 pounds on a load of wholesale goods, things from your portable phone chargers, toilet roll, all sorts of different things. I’d wake up at four or 5am doing boot sales all day, and selling door to door at all the big houses. We’d say ‘this is for a school project’ when obviously it wasn’t, which I know is quite bad, but it was just a sales tactic,” Fortag says, “Once I had sold that out, I wanted to help different groups of young people in the education system, so I created a clothing brand called Ahead of Time Academy. We helped over 100 young people get into fashion-based opportunities, and I was the youngest designer to work with ASOS and Pure London Fashion Show.”

    Ahead of Time was a way for young people to help develop and sell their business and fashion ideas. Through partnerships with clothing and accessory companies, people whose ideas were not getting seen could be elevated to the big leagues at a young age. It ran for about two and a half years before Fortag had his next big idea; Cozmos hospitality.

    “When I was about 17 I wanted to move into the sport space, because I love sport, so I ran a hospitality company, which I still am involved in now. We work with agents all across the world providing sport and travel packages. Now we’ve got over 25 employees and over 500 agents working for us throughout the UK in America,” Fortag says.

    During Covid, Ahead of Time Academy led webinars teaching education materials not taught in school, such as entrepreneurship, mental health pathways, and employability. Now Fortag has started a new charity called the Inside Out Clothing Project, which is the UK’s first clothing brand run by ex-offenders. Fortag explains how Alan Sugar led to the connections necessary to make it happen.

    “While I was running Ahead of Time I got promoted by Alan Sugar, and through that I got interviews with Forbes, the BBC, and the Guardian. When I got interviewed by BBC, I met a reporter called Greg McKenzie. He was in care growing up, and we discussed ideas, and that’s how we created Inside Out,” Fortag says, “The idea was to get the most vulnerable groups of young people to launch their own businesses. It had never been done before in the UK.”

    Now that Inside Out’s eight-week run has come to a close, I asked Fortag about his plans for the future. He answers with quiet, casual confidence.

    “Next we’re hopefully going to be moving into another business soon – we’ve just reached 500 agents worldwide working for us which is obviously a massive achievement, probably one of the biggest deals in UK hospitality this year. On the charity side, we’ll just keep progressing. I’ve got some interesting projects coming up.”

  • Employment lawyer’s top tips on job contracts

    Top employment lawyer Louise Lawrence on job contracts

     

    Patrick Crowder

    “So you’ve got the job! Congratulations!”

    That’s usually where the conversation ends. However, negotiating an employment contract is just as important as nailing the interview, so it’s crucial to know what to look for. Louise Lawrence, who is an employment lawyer at the London-based law firm Winckworth Sherwood LLP, has given some advice on things to watch out for in a new employment contract.

    Lawrence says that the first thing to look at is the presence of a probationary period, as the prospect of termination with little notice is something which can jeopardise an employee’s financial security.

    “These can have benefits for both parties as if you end up not liking your new role you can move on quickly.  However it can also be disenchanting to see that your employment can be terminated on very short notice,” Lawrence says, “Consider asking for the probationary period to be removed or extending the notice period to give you some financial comfort if things do not work out and the business dismisses you during the probationary period.”

    Of course, a major concern should be salary. Lawrence says to not be afraid of negotiating a higher number, and to ensure that your salary will be reviewed regularly to combat the rising cost of living.

    “Don’t be afraid to ask for more than was originally suggested. With the cost of living going up, also check when your salary will be first reviewed and what the business’s process is in relation to salary reviews,” Lawrence says.

    Alongside salary come bonuses, which can take different forms. Sign-on bonuses and performance bonuses should both be examined carefully to find out what exactly the requirements for receiving and keeping them are.

    “You may be offered a sign-on bonus as well as performance bonuses.  Sign-on bonuses often contain repayment provisions if you leave the business within a certain period so check what these are and whether there is a sliding scale of repayment relating to how long you stay with the business as this would be more reasonable than you having to repay the whole amount no matter how long you have stayed with the business,” Lawrence says,  “For performance bonuses find out what criteria you have to meet and obtain as much clarity in writing as possible before you enter into the contract. You may also want to negotiate a guaranteed bonus for the first year while you get up and running at the new business.”

    With the talent war raging, benefits are more important than ever, so it is worth knowing what you will be getting in order to make an informed decision about accepting an offer.

    “Employers are focussing on what benefits they can offer to employees in the war for talent.  Find out what benefits you will be eligible for and in particular whether private medical insurance, critical illness insurance and death-in-service benefits are provided,” Lawrence says.

    Flexibility and holiday are two important factors. At the moment, businesses offering remote work may be offering it only temporarily, so this is worth finding out before you sign on. Workers are entitled to 28 days of holiday time, including bank holidays, per year. Any more than that is up to the company, so this is information can be found in your contract. As Lawrence points out, sick pay also has a statutory minimum, so check if your potential employer offers more.

    “A number of employers have contractual sick pay arrangements where they agree to pay more than this.  Have a think about whether you feel those periods are reasonable and also ideally whether they dovetail with any critical illness cover in case you become ill with a serious condition,” Lawrence says.

    If the employment contract mentions other texts, such as a staff handbook or specific policies, you should ask for these documents before you sign. They often cover things like maternity and paternity leave as well as emergency leave policies.

    A new job often feels like the beginning of an exciting journey, but most of the time that journey will end at some point, so it is good to be prepared. Lawrence explains the importance of minimum notice periods for both the employer and employee.

    “Statutory minimum notice periods are short,” Lawrence says, “These require that after one month’s employment, an employee and employer must give each other one week’s notice.  The notice period that an employer has to give then increases by each year of service up to a maximum of 12 weeks’ notice after 12 years’ service. Contracts often include a right for the business to pay a lump sum in lieu of notice. If you feel that the notice provisions are one-sided, ask for them to be made fairer.”

    The final point to look out for is any agreement which may limit what you do professionally after leaving the company. If a non-competition agreement is signed without much consideration, it could leave a former employee unable to work in their field if they are fired or choose to leave.

    “There could be a non-compete covenant preventing you working from a competitor for a certain period or covenants preventing you from soliciting and dealing with clients for a certain period,” Lawrence says, “There is no requirement in the UK for an employee to have to be paid during the period of the covenants.  If you consider the covenants are too onerous, negotiate these covenants before you enter into the contract.”

    This may seem like many things to check off the list, but it is important to protect oneself in the world of work. Even though most employers are not likely to have predatory or deceptive conditions in their contracts, it is always worth checking, even if only to see what can be negotiated for. Armed with this knowledge, it is our hope that you will be able to accept job offers with confidence.

  • Meet TREIO, the real estate investment office with unique experience in commercial property

    Finito World meets Georgina Badine and Robert Stokely, two of the founding directors of the boutique firm with expertise in an overlooked asset class

    For a good while now, it’s become a normalised aspect of high-net-worth portfolios to have an allocation for real estate – but until recently, this has tended to be synonymous with the residential side, especially superprime properties in central London.

    But you don’t hear so much about commercial property. That’s partly because of the prevalence of broker fees and real estate funds which can sometimes be difficult to understand and poorly run. But it’s also because not enough people know that this asset class also has many legitimate attractions.

    The Real Estate Investment Office (TREIO) was set up in 2020 at the outset of the pandemic to give a select group of high-net-worths access to this intriguing – and all-too-often overlooked – opportunity.

    The firm was founded by three directors, Robert Stokely, Chris Horler and Georgina Badine with collective experience designed to gel perfectly for the task at hand.
    Stokely explains his own background: “I’ve been in the property business for 25 years, in investment and acquisition, and in asset management. I also had a spell as a Law of Property Act Receiver following the 2008 crash, where I was working with Nationwide Building Society and others on their non-performing loan books.”

    Badine, meanwhile, started as a corporate banker at Barclays. “My Relationship Director in my first post got me involved in the credit side, and I found I had a real interest in it. I love getting under the skin of businesses,” she explains.

    Badine’s expertise is especially helpful when it comes to commercial property, where the financial strength of the tenants will underpin the attractiveness of the overall investment, in a way which isn’t the case on the residential side.

    When I meet with the two of them, Horler is in Switzerland due to Omicron restrictions, but I speak to him later by telephone. “I make sure the assets are held in the right structures,” Horler explains.  So it’s a compelling mix: there are the property skills of Stokely in investment and asset management; the credit skills of Badine; and then Horler’s structuring and finance skills. Badine adds: “We all bring different strengths to the business.”

    These different kinds of experience give shape to the advice which TREIO gives clients. “We’re not risk-averse, but we are risk-aware,” as Stokely puts it, noting both his own time as a receiver, and Badine’s expertise on the credit side. What comes across is the firm’s passion for the asset class, and its commitment to thoroughness and a holistic service.

    So how did they meet? The three of them came together at the multi-family office Sandaire (now part of Schroders) where they provided a unique property offering to that firm’s dozen or so ultra-high-net-worth families: “Traditionally, families have invested in residential property, often in central London and in real estate funds,” Stokely explains. “But it’s quite difficult to align those investments to your investment criteria and it’s hard to discern between the good funds and the poorer ones. And once you put your money into those funds, it can be hard to get your money out, especially if they gate.”

    After the sale of Sandaire, the three of them decided not to move to Schroders, though TREIO retains good referral relationships with that organisation. During the Sandaire days, in spring 2019 – before anyone knew about spike proteins, or supply issues arising from the pandemic – clients were worried about the inflationary outlook. “Inflation has always been at the forefront of families’ minds,” Stokely recalls. “Inflation is the big ever-present danger which erodes their wealth.”

    Happily, commercial property as an asset class is able to navigate that problem: “The advantage of commercial property is that it’s linked to the real economy,” Stokely continues. “In an inflationary environment, when prices go up, rents follow suit. If you’ve constructed your portfolio in an appropriate manner, you can catch those inflationary rental increases year by year.”

    There’s clear sense to this – and it will not be lost on clients who have bumped up against the difficulties of accessing the sector. “At Sandaire, we found clients found it hard to access appropriate investment opportunities,” Stokely explains. “The property business is based on transactional fees, and brokers have an incentive to do deals particularly as they approach their financial year end. That creates a misalignment between the interests of the investor and the interests of the broker.” Badine says: “What we’ve done is to invert that business model. We charge our clients a fee for managing their real estate allocation.”

    This might not sound radical – but in its quiet way it is. It essentially aligns TREIO with the broader private client world, but in relation to an asset class numerous wealthy individuals understand all too little. “It’s the difference between the professional, and the trusted advisor who is looking out for their clients,” Badine explains. Stokely adds: “Someone said to me the other day that I’m an analogue adviser in a digital world – and I’m happy with that!”
    My guess is that clients will be too. People do not want robots; they want relationships. Badine explains the distinction: “Brokers do deals and we do long-term relationships. For us, the relationship doesn’t end with the transaction.”

    At the outset, TREIO works closely with each client. Stokely says: “The start of the process is establishing what kind of investments are appropriate for the client in terms of risk profile, holding period, sector and geographical location.” It doesn’t stop there; Stokely lists other considerations. “Does the client want a trophy asset in central London? Do they have a preference as to sector? Are they trying to achieve something in terms of ESG and sustainability? Do they want one tenant or multiple tenants.”

    It’s a rigorous process in other words – and again, one that a broker, worried about their transaction fees, won’t enter into. TREIO therefore offers unique access to an unusually promising asset class. The firm also works in concert with chief investment advisors and wealth managers to make sure that the right asset is acquired – and once acquired, that it’s properly looked after. “Once we acquire a property, we oversee the management, including rent collection, rent reviews, reviewing leases, and capital improvements to the buildings,” Stokely says. “We then continue to report to the client or their financial advisors so long as that asset remains in their ownership.” So what are the firm’s fee structures? “They’re structured in such a way that we’re paid for the management of that allocation – sometimes with an additional performance-related fee.”

    The beauty of the model is that the firm is also able to work with existing wealth managers.

    “We’re not in competition with Schroders – they’re happy to make introductions to us,” Badine explains. “I’ve also met a number of wealth managers who value what we do, as it reinforces their offering. What they can say to their clients is: ‘Why not allocate 20 per cent of your wealth to commercial property? We know the right people.’ It makes their offer more complete as it’s something they don’t do in-house.”

    The firm already has strong links with some private banks, and is seeking to grow those in 2022 – but always with a view to establishing the right kind of relationships. “We want to be trusted advisors for the long term, as we were at Sandaire,” explains Badine.

    The entrenched nature of the firm’s client relationships means that the firm is also able to offer an audit service. “We can do forensic analysis of whether a fund is performing as it should be, whether the managers are managing the fund well, or taking excessive fees,” Stokely says.
    Badine adds: “We also provide audits on existing commercial property holdings, often in relation to ESG.” Stokely also points to a problem Finito World readers might need to be aware of: “With the direction and pace of travel on sustainability, some investors will be left with unlettable or unsaleable assets as they’re non-compliant. Amazingly, a lot of investors are seemingly oblivious to this.”

    That opens up onto an interesting generational aspect about this particular asset class. “Property is an asset which is naturally understandable across generations,” Stokely explains. “At Sandaire, we found that where we had a private equity offering, the younger generations were enthusiastic about the tech element, for example, whereas the patriarch or matriarch might be doubtful about it.  Property is of enduring appeal across generations. It’s something which brings generations together, and you sometimes see families unite behind this asset class. Both generations can bring something to the table, whether it be sustainability, or architectural appearance.”

    There is real passion here. As we keep talking, I am also impressed that there’s such a strong sense of identity about the business, even at this early stage. Stokely says: “Because we’re a small business, and want to remain like that, we can invest time in building those in-depth relationships with our clients. We don’t want to grow to a size where we lose that.”

    And listening to them, you certainly wouldn’t bet against them. This is a firm with a rare ethos and expertise, which presents a real opportunity for high net worth individuals.

    Christopher Jackson is News Director at Finito World

  • Portrait painter Nicky Philipps: ‘Even the most creative person can’t drum something up out of nothing’

    The great portrait-painter explains where we went wrong in modern arts education

     

    My decision to be an artist wasn’t really a light bulb moment because my mother, father, maternal grandmother, and paternal grandfather all painted.  It ran through the family and when we were little, my mother would make us copy Beatrix Potter figures.
    At that time, I was mad about horses and wanted to paint them all the time. I would look at Stubbs and Munnings, and experiment a lot in both watercolour and oil.
    I went one day to see the brilliant horse painter, Susan Crawford who was wonderfully encouraging and said she’d heard about the Cecil-Graves school in Florence. I was immediately interested as I was quite depressed by my experience of British art schools who had virtually stopped life drawing and offered very little structure. I feel their approach has represented an awful decline. Rather than adopting any rigorous training, my teachers used to lay out some object or other and say “express yourselves…” and just leave us to it. I gather it is much the same today.


    This kind of non existent teaching fails to realise that even the most creative and imaginative person may have difficulty drumming up something out of nothing. I suppose in retrospect they were at least facilitating us to draw and paint, but we never had access to top class materials and the whole place was grotty and altogether rather uninspiring. So I left.
    That’s when I went to Florence and it totally changed everything. Indeed, it is why I became a professional painter. I enrolled at the Studio Cecil Graves set up by two Americans who wanted to keep alive the whole tradition of classical art training. It’s interesting that amid all the decline, it should be in north America – supposedly the New World – that the sight-size technique, originating with Leonardo Da Vinci but used most prolifically by the 18th century French academy, has been preserved.

    In those days, before you went on to be an apprentice you had to train your eye. This was fundamental and it was done by making the student carry out a series of drawings of plaster casts concentrating on shapes, angles and tone, basically the grammar of drawing. This rigorous teaching was a complete revelation to me and I find it a real shame that the arts education in the UK largely does not rate it. I am constantly asked by young aspiring painters where they can actually be ‘taught’ to draw and hearing the bitterness of older people who wanted to paint for a living but without the structure to progress their ability, simply and sadly gave up.


    In Florence, the ethos was that you had to draw the plaster cast, exactly as it was. I am convinced that most people who try and are encouraged to look and look and look again would be able to draw an object better than they think. Not once have I encountered anyone who when asked to compare their drawing of an  object (a jug for instance,) to the real thing, hasn’t been able to point out where they have gone wrong. It’s not that they can’t see, it’s just that when copying, they haven’t looked hard enough.

    Of course this first stage of cast drawing is only the start and should be followed up by an intensive study of the Old Masters. This encourages an understanding of composition and colour, vital in any successful painting. They were Old Masters for a reason after all…..
    As a student in London I was never told that Monet and Renoir, and even Matisse and Picasso had actually had a classical training. The feeling was that if one restricted oneself to the ‘cage’ of academic drawing, it would compromise one’s imaginative flair and all paintings would look the same. But this seems to me to be nonsense if you compare Leonardo da Vinci and Monet, for instance.
    Reynolds wrote in his discourses to his students that it was their duty after the cast drawing tuition, to study the Old Masters and then “ to do their own thing.” That third part is what makes painters different is why we have Sargent and Seurat, Van Dyck and Van Gogh, Chardin and Chagall, Poussin and Picasso. All painters with distinctly different styles. There is really nothing wrong with training one’s eye properly, and indeed it helps one to better appreciate the world in all its glory.

    Almost as important to a young art student is the emphasis on the aesthetic. The Florentine studio was a beautiful oval room in a converted church filled with half finished marble sculptures and plaster casts. A properly paid, good-looking model with a shapely figure would be draped over a huge velvet chair with artistic lighting creating wonderful shadows. By the window would be a student holding his palette as Vermeer and Velasquez show in their self-portraits. I immediately knew I wanted to be there. The atmosphere was fabulous.
    I look back and I think how incredibly lucky I was and long to hear that similar processes are once again to be adopted for British art schools.

    Nicky Philipps is a portrait-painter, especially famous for her portraits of Queen Elizabeth II

  • The Kickstart Scheme in retrospect

    Finito World

    The government’s Kickstart Scheme came to a close in March of 2022. The scheme was designed to make it easier for employers to create jobs for people 16 to 24 years old on Universal Credit. Around 300,000 people took part in the scheme, which cost £1.9 billion.

    Kickstart covered the full National Minimum Wage for 25 hours a week over six months, as well as necessary National Insurance and pension contributions. Employers also received £1,500 per job created in order to cover training, IT, PPE, and uniforms if necessary.

    The price comparison website Small Business Prices analysed the Kickstart Scheme to find where the most roles were filled, which sectors were most popular, and what age groups benefitted most from the programme.

    Overall, 68% of the Kickstart roles were filled in Great Britain. Scotland saw the highest numbers, with 73.7% of roles filled. In England, the West Midlands saw the most roles filled, at 73.3%, followed closely by the East Midlands, the North East, and Yorkshire and The Humber. Wales filled 65% of the roles available.

    Of the available jobs, the animal care sector saw the highest level of employment at 80%. The creative/media and law sectors had 78% of their roles filled, followed closely by science and research as well as computing technology.

    Most people who took advantage of the scheme were between 22 and 23 years old. Under 18s and 25-year-olds were least likely to find a job through Kickstart, with less than 1% of successful applicants being from those age groups.

    Credit: SmallBusinessPrices.co.uk

  • A look at the video game industry

    Patrick Crowder

    In the past 30 years, video games have gone from something experienced in an arcade, or on a home computer by a very select few, to a massive industry which makes upwards of £155 billion per year. The online gaming platform Solitaired analysed data from Indeed UK to find the highest paying roles and the best places to work in the video game sector.

    If you want to earn big money in the gaming industry, the best way to do it is to become a game developer. Game developers code and test the software which makes the idea for a game come to life. On average across the UK they make £43,469 per year. Game developers in London have the highest pay, at £59,940 per year.

    If coding doesn’t interest you, have no fear, as the second highest paying role in video games doesn’t require it.  Marketing managers are in charge of creating campaigns to find an audience for a game, and to promote that game in a way which maximises sales. They make £38,278 per year on average, making this a great way to get into the industry if you don’t have a background in computer programming. London is also the place to go for video game marketing, where you will see an average salary of £43,178 per year.

    An important yet oft overlooked role within the video games industry is that of the Quality Assurance tester. Before a game rolls out to the public, QA testers have to figure out every way that the game can be broken. When a game has millions of players, they will find new and innovative ways to mess things up by odds alone, so a good tester has to predict multiple failure modes and address them. QA testers make £35,919 on average, though those who work in Cambridge make £46,976 per year on average.

    3D artists create everything you see when you play a video game, from your favourite characters, vehicles, and weapons to the mountains you climb, and the trees you accidentally drive into. They make £35,828 on average, but London-based 3D artists earn about £43,616 per year. For those with an inclination towards the visual arts, this can be a great career which uses your creativity to earn a good living.

    If you want to get into the video game industry from a background in business, consider becoming a video game producer. Rather than dealing with coding or creating the art of a game, producers do the necessary jobs which players rarely think about. Marketing, budget, contract negotiation, and scheduling all fall under the video game producer’s umbrella, making it a role with considerable variety. They make around £33,796 per year across the UK, but producers based in Liverpool make the highest wage for their role in the country, netting around £38,802 per year.

    These are by no means the only roles available in the video game industry – far from it. Like any business, IT services, HR, market research, and sales representation are all necessary, along with writing the text and script for a game, voice acting characters, and translating games into different languages. If you’re wondering if the video game industry has a place for you, it does, because the roles available are a lot broader than you think.

    Credit: solitaired.com

  • Which industries have the biggest gender pay gap?

    Finito World

    The gender pay gap gets intense but intermittent attention. A report is released outlining often extreme inequality, then in a few short weeks it becomes easy to forget that the problem has not yet been solved. That’s why we’re looking at research from the office space provider Instant Offices to see which industries have not yet bridged the gap.

    The most common place to find gender pay gaps is the hospitality industry. Instant offices found that women earn £2,767 less than men annually in the waiter and waitressing sector, even though they have the same qualifications and experience. Female bartenders earn £2,689 less per year than their male counterparts.

    The largest discrepancy in pay was found among physicians and surgeons, where women who are just as qualified earn £23,056 less than men per year. Interestingly, the inequalities of the healthcare industry also extend to the care of animals, as we can see that veterinarians who are women make £8,223 less per year.

    Instant Offices recommends a variety of ways to address this inequality. Incentivising paternity leave allows fathers to more equally split the work which goes into looking after a newborn, while helping mothers to have more time to spend on their careers.

    An increase in government subsidised childcare would also take the pressure off of women who work low-wage jobs. Finally, pay transparency can allow candidates to make an informed decision about accepting an offer, so that they can be confident that they are not earning an unfair wage.

    Credit: https://www.instantoffices.com

  • Pandemic led to increased whistleblowing, report finds

    Patrick Crowder

    Whistleblowing is an important driver of change. When legislation fails, or when companies fail to follow legislation, whistleblowers are often the last line of defence against unsafe, immoral, and unfair working practices.

    The whistleblowing hotline provider Safecall has analysed data from over 2.5 million employees to find out how the pandemic has affected the number of whistleblowers and the methods they use. Greg Ogle, Safecell’s client account manager who authored the report, explains why the research is necessary.

    “The data is designed to inform and help organisations make better decisions when it comes to establishing whistleblowing arrangements. It should help HR and health & safety managers or departments to determine and measure performance of their organisation against their peers.”

    Safecall found that HR was the most commonly reported department, making up 55% of all reports in 2021. While the complaints included instances of bullying and racism, the most common reason for HR-related reports was ‘unfair treatment’.

    Tim Smith, who is Safecall’s operations director, says that he has seen a shift towards whistleblowing as a result of the pandemic.

    “The pandemic seems to have accelerated different patterns of working and behaviour. This, in turn, has made more employers look at culture change and that has prompted greater interest and use of whistleblowing services,” Smith says.

    Culture change certainly had an impact, but there is also the simple reason that there were more health and safety concerns during the pandemic than normal. Beyond the threat of the virus, new ways of working led to different challenges in terms of both health and safety and fair employee treatment.

    The number of health and safety reports is still elevated, but there are still fewer reports than in 2020 when we began to see the pandemic’s affect on the workplace.

    https://www.safecall.co.uk/en/